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I will admit to be one of those idiots.
I talk to dogs, cows, horses by barking/mooing/nickering softly back to them, not to set them off, just conversing and they seem to respond, some of them.

Now, I have seen what you speak of, people confronting the dogs and barking back at them to rile them.
Makes me wish the fence would get a hole and the dogs would come visit the barkers.

I tell you a sad story.
Years ago our then new vet got a new aussie puppy he kept in his yard.
High school kids would go to school and back home down the alley behind his yard and hit the wooden fence to scare the puppy.
The vet didn't know that for long time and by the time he did, the puppy was grown and started growling at kids and becoming hard to handle.
Didn't end up good, the kids had taught that puppy to become aggressive past the point of being safe.

Hard to say what to do in your situation, that you don't already have thought about.
Hope you can solve that without getting in trouble.

Lex is going to fill me in on things here...I guess I needed to get up to speed on what I was dealing with. I thought I was in a nice enough neighborhood. If worse comes to worse, I'll get armed for bear and they can deal with me another day.

I think I made a wise choice not going out though.

Landlady thinks so too.

So...to get over this, she's taking me on a trail ride.

I love this place. Crazy people and all.

A good horseman doesn't have to tell anyone...the horse already knows.

Lex is going to fill me in on things here...I guess I needed to get up to speed on what I was dealing with. I thought I was in a nice enough neighborhood. If worse comes to worse, I'll get armed for bear and they can deal with me another day.

I think I made a wise choice not going out though.

Landlady thinks so too.

So...to get over this, she's taking me on a trail ride.

I love this place. Crazy people and all.

It's a bummer that your neighborhood isn't turning out to be too great but your landlord sounds wonderful! Moving to new areas is such a crapshoot no matter how much research you do. We once moved to California in what we thought was a nice family neighborhood with an elementary school nearby...yeah...S.W.A.T. team at the house a few doors down in the early a.m. more than once and one night a police helo overhead the next block over. I tell ya, our doors were never left unlocked and I was really grateful to have a large dog inside with us.

In response to your title: "Are people just idiots? Dog-related." YES. Haha. Actually, you can leave out the "dog-related" modifier!

If it had been big dudes, I might not have gone out, depending on the neighborhood. For ladies though, I would have definitely opened the door and given some sort of icy, "I'm sorry, can I help you?" or, what my dad sometimes does to people behaving like idiots, a sincere, "I'm sorry, ma'am/sir, are you okay?"

When we used to live in New Orleans, people would often have their dogs out behind wrought iron fences where they can see everything - drunk people CONSTANTLY bark at dogs. I would probably never have my dogs out unless I was sitting out with them.

I meow at my kitties = ) I don't moo at cows, though I can see the urge. I sometimes roo along with my pup because she does it so rarely that I like to encourage her.

When I was about 7 years old the neighbor boy was teasing our poodle. Now, he was around the same age (not as if I took on a 13 year old). My parents were having the deck screened in at the time, so there was a bunch of lumber lying around. When the dog squealed in pain from having his ears pulled, I grabbed a length of 2x4 and took the little turd out with a solid whack behind the knees. Once he was able to regain his feet, he ran home (across the street) crying.

Of course he tattled, and I'm sure he left out the part about hurting the dog. His mom paid a visit, but once my parents heard my side of the story, I didn't get punished.

I'd step out of the door, video camera in hand, laughing my head off, and say "Well, THIS is going to go viral on Youtube for sure....may even win the big prize om America's Funniest Home Videos! Thanks for the entertainment!"

I opened my front door one day to two teenagers taunting my dogs through the door. I had an eighty pound Gordon stud by the collar in one hand and a 75 pound stud by the collar in the other. When I opened the door both studs were standing on their back feet almost eye to eye with the kids pulling against their collars.

Let me tell you those teenagers can move fast when they want to!!!!! One of them just about fell backwards down the front steps. Don't mess with my dogs!! Or me!

Probably the same kind of asshat that berates someone for several minutes straight at an ice cream shop for perceived slights and slow service when there's a rush and several customers behind them....

Probably the same kind of asshat who eats a meal at a restaurant, makes a big stink about the meal being horrible after they have eaten it, and demands a replacement meal to go, all while being morbidly obese.....

Probably the same kind of asshat who works with kids who have problems and tells everyone outside of work that they hate children by making fun of the ones they work with and saying that they would like to physically harm them.....

Those are the type of asshats who probably bark at dogs to aggrivate them.....and we have many such folks around here.

Thus do we growl that our big toes have, at this moment, been thrown up from below!

I don't get it either. Most often kids.....I cannot fathom adults who bark at dogs.

We keep a flock of laying hens that are quire personable and free range on our property. People cluck to them...what is this stupid human behavior about? And it's almost ALWAYS grown ups who do it. It does make it obvious rather quickly who the real dumb cluckers are, though...

I would have yanked open the door a delivered a healthy blast of super soaker ice cold water. "Sorry. I thought that the neighbors dogs were outside the door. I must be mistaken. Did you see a dog, I could have swore I heard some ridiculous barking out here?"

FWIW I had a giggle at Lex's sig line change, and was all ready to get fluffed up over the fact that he had 'stories' he wasn't going to share! We can always use a good giggle.

It's a bummer that your neighborhood isn't turning out to be too great but your landlord sounds wonderful! Moving to new areas is such a crapshoot no matter how much research you do. We once moved to California in what we thought was a nice family neighborhood with an elementary school nearby...yeah...S.W.A.T. team at the house a few doors down in the early a.m. more than once and one night a police helo overhead the next block over. I tell ya, our doors were never left unlocked and I was really grateful to have a large dog inside with us.

Rumor has it that weed is the CA's largest cash crop. And many are setting up grow rooms in rented houses owned by banks when folks hurt in the housing crisis walked.

A well-run dope operation is not an enormous threat to a neighborhood. Those guys want to mind their own business... quietly.

I once watched an adult man in a parking lot approach a parked car with the windows cracked and a dog in it. The dog was barking like crazy. I was concerned that he might break the windows. The man started teasing the dog by putting his hand in the car and yanking it out. Luckily the dog seemed to re-think his brave stance when the hand was in the car, but for the life of me I just can't understand why someone would do that. It could have very easily ended in a very serious, ongoing medical condition with his hand.

I once watched an adult man in a parking lot approach a parked car with the windows cracked and a dog in it. The dog was barking like crazy. I was concerned that he might break the windows. The man started teasing the dog by putting his hand in the car and yanking it out. Luckily the dog seemed to re-think his brave stance when the hand was in the car, but for the life of me I just can't understand why someone would do that. It could have very easily ended in a very serious, ongoing medical condition with his hand.

I think that the fact that they were adult women doing it was what bothered me. I got my dogs quieted down just fine. BUt what kind of asshat barks at dogs?

Be glad they are just barking at your dogs - in return I'm guessing ie dogs barked 1st (if not, then they are in a whole different category) - and not throwing things at them, threatening to shoot them, actually poisoning them ...
so no, I have no problems with someone just barking back